SG: Innocent Bystander #4 - Horror Movie Monster

[Whitney Taylor]

Episode 4: Horror Movie Monster




Savannah, 1993


In the mist of the morning

While the beast was asleep

Woke up with a plan so brilliant I could not believe


--My Bones, The Pretty Reckless



The house stood alone on the swampy, unfashionable edge of the lake. It was large and dirty white and much too old. The small, neat dark-haired man took a few moments to settle his breathing before walking up its front stairs to ring the faded doorbell.


Whistling along with the melody of the chime, he took in his surroundings. The lawn, clearly intended to be sweeping and meticulously manicured, was not. Anything could have been hiding in it. Improvising a nervous tune, the man assessed the distance to his own battered car. He was trying to estimate how fast he could reach it at a sprint when he heard a slow creak.


"No solicitors." The door had been opened by a gray-robed androgyne. They gave the newcomer a cursory inspection. "Is this a... religious call?"


"Er, no, ah..." He straightened his back, an aid to scraping his thoughts back together. "My name is Stefan Lightbourne. I've come to see Doctor Kelley." The door opener regarded him with flat swamp-green eyes, so he fumbled on. "I--I hear he has some, ah, alternative medical skills. I... I would be willing to pay." *Not with my soul, don't start with the soul as an opening bid!* Though he might be willing to finish there, yes. Stefan steeled himself.


Was it his imagination, or had the stern, delicate features softened a little in curiosity? Certainly he was getting examined again, this time with greater interest. "Not for myself! It, it's my daughter. She..." He let it pour out of him, the sickness, the prognosis, the pain and growing weakness in one who should have only been growing stronger. The bitterness and rage blooming in one who should have been so innocent. He made himself stop before he got to the medical bills, though. He might need to promise wealth. And so, choking on his words and clinging to his dignity, he waited for the door to close on his last hope.


A lifetime later, the head bowed, falling into the shadow of the gray hood. "My name is Max. Please come in, petitioner." The figure stood back, sweeping an arm back to usher Stefan Lightbourne across the threshold.


*****


Jacksonville, present


Ed Hinkle sat across the road from the cafe, car windows down in the hope that the late afternoon heat could warm the chill which had crept into him the moment he read the address sent to him by text. What were the odds that his old war buddy Sophie's little girl would come to work in this exact spot?


Song came drifting in from somewhere:


{Deep in the night, boundless violence will seethe with the danger

Our laws collide not allowing another contender

When the wine drinks itself, you will burn to a cinder

We're fighting time, awaiting the answers}


Ed grimaced. If some fool had to play their music loud enough for him to hear, couldn't they pick something nice to listen to? He was already on edge just from the memories this place dredged up. Not for the first time this past dozen years, he craved a six pack something fierce. He said a quick prayer instead, because he wasn't that person anymore.


Ruddy, fading daylight illuminated the face of the strip mall that had been built over the old lot. It didn't surprise Ed to see that only one business was open. The half-constructed building he was parked outside of looked abandoned too. As if the location wasn't bad enough, there were some strange customers going in and out of the doors. Some of them cared enough to put on civilian clothes, but others just wrapped a trench coat or hoodie over whatever. Heck, some of them couldn't have passed for normal no matter how they tried. Sophie was right to be concerned, but he would be relieved to report that at least the place wasn't a strip club.


{Is there a way to turn the mind of a barbaric stranger?

Eternal days awaiting for you to awake, my avenger}


He should get going. He really hadn't come to stake the place out. Heh. ‘Stake', get it? He shook the pun from his head violently. Whatever he'd thought once upon a time, it was before he had found religion.


{A cruel fate now condemns us to *burn to a cinder*...}


Was it his imagination, or was there a mocking note in the song now? Mocking him?


{Are we too late, running on empty?}


"Dammit, I am washed clean of my sins!" Ed insisted, pounding on his steering wheel.


{Give me answers to my prayers

We'll never hide, we'll face the glare

You're the light I see to, *raise the flame* and *blaze the fire*}


In his mind's eye, Ed saw the flames rising, and heard drunken, gleeful yells, and knew somewhere inside that his faith would never be enough to turn these ghosts. Gunning the engine, he peeled out into the road fast enough to burn rubber.


*****


"Hello, Mina!" chorused Amara and Zayd, the two enigmatic, pink-clad superguys as Mina removed some dirty cups from an adjacent table. "How are you doing?"


"Just fine, thanks!" she responded, smiling bright. Thankfully, this seemed to satisfy them as they went back to their Jenga tower without inviting her to join them. She had been avoiding their table in the corner as much as she was able out of dread of such an invite, trying to refrain from even looking out the window they were sitting at.


Thus it was that she did not know she was being stalked until one of her coworkers commented.


"That cat's been out there for half an hour. Do you think she wants us to let her in?"


Mina looked up to see a figure pressed against the front window, black-tipped ears poking through holes cut in a hoodie. Maow's big blue cat eyes gazed at her through the window, tail twitching. Amara and Zayd, sitting directly in front of her, were paying no attention, and she did not look at them.


"Great," Mina groaned. She'd really hoped they had given up after being scared off by the pink weirdos last time. This time, though, she'd come prepared.


Mina ducked into the break room long enough to fetch her fancy, sci-fi laser pointer and make sure her brown hair was secure in its bun. Then back through the cafe, her stride as purposeful and determined as possible to discourage customer interruptions such as "get me a slice of pie" or "is that thing a gun?"


The catgirl made a gratifyingly startled squeak when Mina flung the door open with gusto, her gun shaped laser pointer in full view. "Hi there! May I help you?"


"Mmmmm... I... I wannnnted to see if you were all rrright. And... hmmm. Just mmmake sure you weren't hurt. Afterrrr."


"Oh." Mina blinked, briefly dropping her protective customer service demeanor in surprise. "Yes. I'm okay, I think. You... can come in if you want. Of course," She glanced pointedly at the window, where the strange man and woman sat, "I have other customers to serve." The man smiled and waved, and Maow's ears went flat.


"I don't like those people. They have bad powers. They smell... off." She looked reproachfully at Mina, as if the presence of bad people were somehow her fault. "You should stay away."


Mina waved politely to the pallid man, then turned back to Maow. "Maybe I misunderstood things last night, but didn't you and your friends threaten to torture and kill me? Before those two came and rescued me?"


"Wouldn't have done it. Not really," muttered the catgirl.


"Not really? Well that's reassuring."


"You should give us the machine. It's... the right thing to do."


"Listen, I did a little research after we met the first time. A couple years ago, a half-eaten body was left on the steps of the police headquarters. They found bite marks that looked like some kind of animal, like a large cat..."


Maow turned her back, tail lashing. "Some of us have... less than perfect control... of our instincts."


"...and the man's DNA was a match for several rape kits. I get that you were trying to fight crime, which is more than most people do in this city including the cops, and I'm not that sad about this guy, but like. You literally ate him. That's gross."


"We are hhhhalf cat. Some, mmmmore than half. Our training for interactinnnnnng with humans was... nnnnnot ideal."


"Eating a guy is not the same as messing up the furniture!" Mina insisted. "I wouldn't trust you psychos with superscience mind control equipment even if I did know where it was!"


"Now you're just being ableist." the catgirl pouted.


"Oh for--ableism is when you don't build a ramp, it's not--oh never mind. I just want to know--are your friends going to keep coming after me or what?"


"Nnnnnnnnnno," Maow sulked, sending one last beseeching blue gaze over her shoulder. "We're done with yoooou and yoooooour stupid machine." And she slunk off into the twilight, shoulders hunched and tail down, provoking in Mina a truly irrational wave of guilt.


*****


Several days later


Ed found the five candles burning the night the storm took his power out. They were standing with no holders on the trunk where he kept his blessed ammunition, but when he opened it, he found the whole thing full of water. He had to face the facts then. He was being haunted, well and truly, and it had all started with his visit to that strip mall of the damned.


"Industrial" written in the dust on the back window of his car. Strange noises waking him at night, guns falling off the wall, guitar strings snapping, mysterious voices in the wind, his signed photograph of Elvis knocked over so that the King's face was hidden. All that, and the dreams had gotten worse. It had been too long since he purified his house, and something had gotten in.


Well, he knew what to do with dark spirits. (*Were* they?) This time they had picked the wrong residence to infest. (*Had* they?) And now they would taste a little divine justice.


(Would *they*?)


He picked up the fallen photograph of Elvis, gave it a kiss, and placed it reverentially back on the TV. Then he knelt in the center of his living room and began to summon the spark within himself.


The window blew in with a stunning crash, as if an explosion had happened on the other side. A gust of wind and rain invaded the room, knocking Ed's makeshift shrine to the ground. He was trying to re-gather his wits in the aftermath when the voice hissed directly in his ear, venomous with contempt:


"You are a mage!"


*****


She was just changing into her sneakers to go home when she heard the dreaded words: "Mina, can I have a word with you?"


Mina gulped. Suddenly the ride home through Florida rain was longer the most dreaded event in her immediate future. "Coming!" She stood up. There was no point in delaying.


Leda Milani sat on a stool in the middle of the deserted dining area. She was gazing at the window table, the rectangular wooden blocks on its surface dappled with streetlight shining through the wet windowpane. "I hear you've become a hit with certain customers."


"I'm just trying to be polite."


"That's good. It's good to be polite. Those are very important customers to keep happy. But I'd like to warn you away from accepting any favors from them, or any of our clientele for that matter." Leda's eyes were dark pools in the low light of closing time. "You don't want to be in any kind of debt. We can't have you working here if you're... compromised."


"Ah..." Mina's mind flashed back to last week, when she had been saved from an army of angry catgirls by the same customers she was being warned against now. She wondered if it would be better to come clean now, or--


The door swung open to a chime. In came the soaking Maow, half-carrying a bruised and bleeding man.


"I found this human outside talking to an invisible spirit!" the catgirl declared to the shocked women. "I did not bite him. He was like this already."


"Ed!" cried Mina, stepping forward.


"As you can see," Maow continued as Mina helped the man into a chair, "I *can* deliver humans intact."


"I get it. Thanks, Maow." Mina smiled tentatively at the cat, who started to purr smugly. The question of why she had still been lurking around could wait.


"Have you been waiting outside for long?" inquired Leda, raising an eyebrow at Mina. It had not escaped her notice that the waitress was on a first name basis with both of the newcomers. "And you a felinoid, too! Have some paper towels. Mina, get the first aid kit.."


Mina studiously avoided meeting her eyes, instead turning to Ed. "Do you need an ambulance?"


He waved off the idea. "This? Nah. I've had worse. Just scratches, and my jaw ain't broken."


"What brings you to us tonight?" inquired Leda as Mina applied bandages.


Ed looked up for the first time since coming in. "I tried to call. Phone wasn't working."


"Were you trying to call me? Why?" asked Mina. The man's look worried her--not just the physical injuries, but something in his eyes, sunken deeper than the last time she had seen him.


"To warn you. This ain't a place for you, hon. No offense," he glanced toward Leda, "I swung by here the other day. Somethin' bad happened here, before this place came along.  There's a heavy demonic influence from this place ain't stopped haunting me."


"Mom sent you to spy on me!"


Leda overrode the younger woman's exclamation. "What kind of haunting?"


"Well... yer standard movin' stuff, creepy messages, breakin' things. She don't seem to care for decent religion. Oh, and she sings."


Leda sucked in a sharp breath.


"Can't you do one of those exorcism things?" Mina asked.


"You think I didn't try? But that critter has my number. She can sing louder than me. Even if I can start to get going, she smacks me good. Takes the breath right out of my lungs even. All I could do not to crash the car." Ed wiped his brow, though Mina had dried the rain off his face earlier. "And you know what's funny? Called me a mage."


"Are you?" asked Mina, who had been wondering something of the kind since he had dramatically and flashily exorcized her apartment.


"I channel the pure power of the King."


His voice seemed to lack the conviction the words required, so Mina suggested: "Maybe the King gave you magic."


"Hah. You're a kind-hearted young lady. Maybe He did. But if this is a test of my faith, I'm failing. It was your kitty friend scared off that spirit." He nodded towards Maow, who had taken off her Judas Priest shirt with a total lack of self-consciousness and was wringing water out onto the floor. "I know of your kind. I ain't always approved of your lifestyle, but... thanks for playin' the good Samaritan."


Maow stared at him blankly. "I don't know that game. I saw... something. Attack you. Hard to see. A strange smell, but I think that is your own. Maybe the smell of magic--?" She stopped suddenly, her ears going up.


A moment later, others heard the eerie voice through the sound of the rain:


{The culprit, you act before thinking

Caught in your ignorant sin}


"Ed, wasn't it? Why is this creature hunting you?" Leda broke in.


"It doesn't like mages?"


"No, Mina. That is not it." She turned back to Ed. "She spoke to you. What did she say?"


Mina looked back and forth between the two of them. Leda seemed calm as usual, but her posture had straightened and there was a tension about her that hadn't been there before. Ed Hinkle was looking back with a strange, sad smile on his face, and didn't answer.


The song continued into the silence:


{And lying to your own reflection,

You thought you could hide}


"Ed...?" Mina was getting seriously creeped out. "Hey, why don't you try using your power again? Maybe it won't be able to stop you this time."


{Deprived of my own innocence, denied

The infinity of recurring torment, your comeuppance}


"No. Leda said softly. "This place has its own protections, which won't be interfered with."


"But then..."


"Protections," Leda continued "which will nonetheless not help against that which hunts your friend, Mina. So I will have answers. Because the presence of this man puts all us in danger."


There was silence in the darkened cafe, except for the sound of rain, through which could be heard the sweet, disembodied voice of the singer.


{See, hear the torture inside

Devouring what was left of your pride

You thought it's not going to happen to you,

Thought you could hide}


"She called me a mage." Ed said then, his eyes fixed to a spot on the ground. "Said if I had training, I might give her a fight. Said we both knew why I never got no training. And we did!" He gave a bark of a laugh, a spike of anguished noise that made Mina and Maow jump. "This place must be right on the spot. The same spot where we piled 'em up. I can see 'em! Right there. Fresh and bloody, like we did it just now. Is that part of these fancy protections you talk about? Seein' things?" Ed was pointing to a spot on the floor which contained nothing Mina could see. She looked over at Leda, who met her eyes and shook her head, just slightly.


{Deprived of my own innocence, denied

The infinity of recurring torment, your comeuppance}


Ed didn't bother waiting for an answer. "I'd like to say it was Vince's idea, or the demons of liquor in all of us. But that's a falsehood. I've gotta own my own sins if I wanna be washed clean." He was crying now. Mina started forward, her own eyes brimming, but was held off with a lifted hand. "You wanna hear what I have to say before you go reaching your hand out to me. I did some bad things right on this very spot. UnChristian, un*Kingly* things, no matter what we said at the time."


{Dwelling in your mind, mixed up 'til

Your regret has spread over the sea}


"Those women, we said, they're workin' against nature with their cards and incense and the rest of the ungodly trinkets. They could be up to anything in there--in here, I guess, isn't that right? Someone built this particular den of sin right over it. Anyway, magic never led to nothin' good, we said. That Radian was proof of that. There was a revolution coming, and people like that were gonna get put down before they harmed decent folk. And we talked and talked and got madder and madder--and I don't remember who it was. Coulda been Vince-- he was a bloodthirsty sumbitch-- but it was just as likely to be me. Said we should just go down there now and see what those women were up to."


Even the unseen singer had fallen silent now. "It's a blur from there. It went bad somehow-- no, it was always gonna be bad. I didn't remember 'til right this very moment how bad. I'm lookin' at em now. One of ‘em was no older than you, girl. None of ‘em gave us a fight, surrounded by all their superstitious junk. We piled that harmless hokum up and doused it in gasoline. We were feeling mighty proud of ourselves for fighting the good fight. I don't think a one of those poor women could even cast a spell but we burned them like witches."


Maow's growl was continuous, and quite audible. Leda gave the angry catgirl a quelling look. "I see. The fire that burned the old occult store. That answers my question. I think you should go now."


Ed stood up, slowly looking around. He looked at Mina, and his aging face sagged at whatever he saw there. "Your mama never knew anything about this," he said softly. "I'm sure she never would have sent me to look in on you, if she had. I've tried making up for it a million ways since-- well, you nevermind. Judgement's come for me anyway. I can see the flames risin' up, just like they did then."


He nodded his head at each of them, then headed out.


He was already through the door when Mina emerged from her shocked silence, and shouted at him to stop. Whether he couldn't hear her or chose not to listen, he remained gone. Mina thought of Zayd and Amara, their mysterious power... but the card she had been given lacked a number, and was currently sitting on top of her apartment's microwave anyway. She turned to her duffle bag and rummaged furiously, drawing forth the only super science device she owned.


Leda pursed her lips. "Mina. Is that a gun?"


"A laser pointer. How did you know the ghost was a 'she', anyway? What do you know?"


"I know enough not to interfere with her. You couldn't stop this even if you did have a gun. You just heard the same story I did! Why would you put yourself in danger for such a man?"


"He is problematic in the extreme," agreed Maow. "Although I hope you have not assumed the gender of this noisy spirit."


"I heard him say he was trying to be better. I know he fought against pseudo-demons and the ULA, and he's a friend of Mom and Dad's. And you had doubts, or you wouldn't have asked him why she was hunting him."


"I? Was merely indulging my curiosity. Mina... you're off the clock, so you can do as you like. But I advise against--and there, she's gone. Sometimes I think I just talk to myself."


*****


Ed walked out the door and didn't look back. "Alright, I'm here! Come get me!" he hollered as he strode out into the rain. The only response was the lightning in the sky, the thunderous boom an instant after, and he didn't flinch. Let him be struck down for his sins and spare that ghost the trouble, if that's how this was to end. He felt curiously light.


He kept walking, past his battered SUV in the parking lot and across the street, trying to put distance between himself and the women in the cafe for whatever was to happen next. The spirit continued its silence. Was it hoping to lull him into thinking it had left? "I know you've come to call me to account for what I done," he shouted into rain and darkness, "That's all right, but I ain't lettin' you toy with me no more!" His feet splashed into the mud of the abandoned construction site, and he stopped. The lights from the streets barely illuminated the hulking, unfinished mass. He cleared his throat, and drew a deep breath.


{In the twilight glow i see her

Blue eyes crying in the rain

When we kissed goodbye and parted

I knew we'd never meet again}


He had never been a great singer, hardly worthy of the King's works, but he poured his whole heart and soul into "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain", the last song Elvis had sung before his miraculous ascension.


{Love is like a dying ember

Only memories remain

Through the ages i remember

Blue eyes crying in the rain}


He felt the spark of his devotion kindle into power. But before he could reach inward to harness that power, muddy hands grabbed him by the ankles and yanked, plunging him sputtering into a puddle.


The growing flame went out.


"A proper mage could have taught you to focus past that," hissed the voice in his ear, "Too bad."


A dark form loomed over him in the orange streetlight, a structure of concrete and rebar and mud. "Were you too ashamed to seek one out? Or too much in denial? Either way, too late now."


*****


Mina dashed out the door, pausing only briefly under the awning in order to set her laser pointer to its flashlight mode. When she reached the street, her powerful light found them: two figures near the abandoned construction site, Ed prone on the ground as a humanoid figure stalked towards him.


"No!" Mina shouted as a lone semi truck roared between herself and them. When it had passed, the figure had Ed in its grasp. She ran across the now empty street.


The strange figure turned its head towards her. It had no features. "No." it echoed her in a flattened voice.


"Run away, damn fool girl!" Ed cried at her. Then, too quick for her to respond, he was being dragged across the site and into an open, gaping door and darkness.


*****


Ed was let go for an instant, flying hard into a concrete wall. There was a crash from the doorway, and the light from outside was dimmed. Something had been thrown across the opening. He had a dazed moment to be thankful that the girl would be kept away from whatever was coming. Then he was seized and lifted ungently, away and upwards.


"Which one were you?" he asked when he had recovered sufficient breath. "I'm bettin' you're the ghost of the youngest one. That's the face haunts me the most."


For a moment there was no response, as he was borne up the stairs into the top, unroofed floor and rain. Then: "Whatever you like." He found himself suddenly standing on his feet, although still immobilized. "I have said my piece. Speak now to whatever god you wish."


Ed closed his eyes, lifting his face to the sky. Elvis, he prayed, I have not always been a worthy vessel for Your music. I have done things to earn my place in Hell (tm). I have tried to redeem myself--You know how I have tried--but--


"Time enough!" the voice sang out.


The light was within him again, he could feel it burning and ready. He reached for it in a new way; without song, without ritual, and--had he had his youth, had he carried a lighter burden, had he had more *time*... but he had none of these things, and he plunged forward and down, his awakening incomplete, with nothing and no one to catch him.


*****


Mina skidded up to the doorway, stopping as a section of tin sheeting slammed against it with a crash. She kicked the barrier, but something stopped it from falling inward. "That's fine! Worse than you have failed to stop me!" she shouted, hoping the noise of her voice would banish the other voice, the one inside her, which was pointing out that maybe it would be a better idea to just let the metal wall stop her this time. She shone the flashlight around, looking for a convenient tool. When one failed to present itself, she started moving around looking for alternate entrances; not giving herself time to think about what she was doing.


This is how it was that she was on the other side of the building when the body crashed to the ground, barely recognizable, not ten feet away from her.


*****


Song credits:


Burn to a Cinder and Quietus

respectively,

by Epica

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